About West Oaks Hospital The Excel Centers at Friendswood
For years, the Excel Center at Friendswood gave Galveston County something it had few of, which is a structured and hospital affiliated addiction treatment on the south side of the Houston metro, without a residential stay or a drive into the city.
On East Edgewood Drive just off the I-45 corridor between Houston and Galveston, the center operated as the Friendswood outpatient satellite of West Oaks Hospital.
West Oaks is a Joint Commission accredited psychiatric and addiction hospital in Houston that has treated the region for more than 40 years.
West Oaks Hospital and its addiction treatment programs are still functioning throughout the area but they have closed this particular location.
Outpatient Care on the Galveston County I-45 Corridor
The program served adults dealing with alcohol, opioid and other drug addictions. They put a particular focus on co-occurring mental health conditions.
The treatment here was outpatient only. They had partial hospitalization and intensive outpatient programming built around counseling and cognitive behavioral therapy.
These programs were structured enough to be effective but they were scheduled so people from Friendswood, Clear Lake, Pearland, League City and the south Houston suburbs could keep working and stay with their families while in treatment.
A Payer Mix Built for South Houston Metro Families
What set the Friendswood center apart for local families was its variety of payment options.
It took Medicare and state financed plans as well as private insurance and self pay.
This was an unusually wide set of options for an outpatient program and one that gave public coverage and self pay patients a covered path where few existed nearby.
Where Care Continues Today
The Excel Center at Friendswood is no longer open under that name. West Oaks Hospital has rebranded its outpatient network as Branches and the current system has two locations.
There’s Branches Houston on the hospital's Hornwood Drive campus and Branches Katy at 2900 Commercial Center Blvd in Katy, which is the former Excel Center of Katy.
The Friendswood site wasn’t carried into the new network.
The Branches locations continue the same outpatient model of partial hospitalization and intensive outpatient care for substance use and co-occurring conditions.
They’re under the same hospital system with inpatient care, medical detox and residential rehab at the Houston campus.
